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“Nyx.” Zaria was no longer outside my body but inside my mind, our magic tangled, our spirits merged. Her calm enveloped me. All else around us faded. “Let go.”

Panic gripped my chest and flooded my veins, but I released my grip on the flow of the tide, sinking under the weight of the magic.

Zaria took hold of it, parting the flow to direct it into all the places I needed it, and I fell apart from it. A bystander in my own remaking. We had been two souls never able to connect. Now we were one. Unending. Complete.

“Zaria!”

“Don’t distract me.” Joy oozed from her.

“We did it.”

“We did it,” she agreed. I’d never heard her happier.

She drained the crystals, recharging both our reserves. More than any of the crystals in the First Kingdom would have done by far.

When the crystals dropped to the floor, we were standing chest to chest, with her arms around my neck. I slipped mine around her middle and dipped my forehead to rest against hers.

“How do you feel?” Emrys asked.

“Much better than I did,” I said, not letting go of Zaria.

“I told you two wouldn’t be too much,” Jaxus said, a smile coming through his voice.

“You were right.” Emrys shifted into one of the folds of his skirts and pulled out a money purse, giving Jaxus a coin.

“You bet on this?” I asked, breaking apart from Zaria.

“Would you not have?” Jaxus had a sly press to his lips.

“Why would you make me do two? If there was an option for one, I could have controlled it myself.”

“And then the lesson you would not have learned,” Emrys said dryly.

“We’ve found that when a mage is resistant to control, this is the best way to help them,” Jaxus said, no remorse in his voice.

“That was an ambush?” I asked.

“Of sorts.” Emrys wasn’t apologetic, and I was unable to even be mad. It sounded like something Hazel would do to a resistant student.

“Thank you,” I said earnestly before turning to Zaria and taking her hands in mine. “I’m truly sorry for everything I put you through, thinking it was you resisting when it was me.”

“We both had to be patient with each other.” She smiled, squeezing my fingers with hers. “But we got there in the end, didn’t we?”

I brought her hands to my lips and kissed her knuckles. “We did. Thank you for not giving up on me.”

“Love this, but we need to get you two moved to some accommodation if you’re ready,” Jaxus broke in.

“Can’t let us have a single moment, friend?” I scowled at Jaxus.

FIFTY-SIX

NYX

Even with the meld and the advanced healing magic they used here, Dragon’s Bane poisoning really kicked your arse! Days later, my body was still healing.

I was holding power now, my wings were healed over, and my blood was cleansed, but things were just slow to get back to how they were. All the power I held was still being used up at rest as my body directed it for healing. I needed to be able to maintain a full reserve overnight before I would be cleared.

I was getting frustrated.